Effect on Infant Illness of Maternal Supplementation With 400000 IU Vs 200000 IU of Vitamin A

Pediatrics, 04/12/2012

Dos Santos Fernandes TF et al. – These findings suggest that postpartum maternal supplementation with 400000 IU of vitamin A does not provide any additional benefits in the reduction of illness in children aged <6 months; therefore, they do not support the proposal to increase the standard vitamin A dose in the existing WHO protocol.

Methods

This was a randomized controlled, triple-blinded clinical trial conducted at 2 public maternity hospitals in Recife in northeastern Brazil.

There were 276 mother–child pairs that were allocated to 2 treatment groups: 400000 IU or 200000 IU of vitamin A.